Technology, Market and Company Journeys: How Can We Help Them Succeed? - Technopolis: Best Practices for Science and Technology Cities - page 212

Fig. 15 Enterprise established

4.6 Connecting to the Market

Critical to the success of businesses in this process is finding markets and in these
winning customers. One of the problems for micro-companies (1-9 employees)
and small companies (10-50) is finding potential customers and influencing these
to the point of converting them into true customers. To support this process a
number of regional strategies have been developed that have proved to be a
successful formula.
The concept of an outreach programme has been pioneered on the Surrey
Research Park which is based on a team of sector specific business mentors that
have been set targets for working with 80 micro-companies, 35 small companies
with a turnover of between £10 m and £100 m, ten businesses with a turnover of
between £100 m and £500 m, and five businesses that have a turnover of in excess
of £500 m. The purpose of this process is to link larger companies to relevant
small businesses in order to help them develop channels for acquiring technology
that has potential in their market place.
To support this a number of large companies are now setting up open inno-
vation teams that act as technology scouts that take an active role to secure new
ideas for the future. Beneath this layer of activity by the companies such as
ANGLE Technology. Founded in 1994 on the Surrey Research Park, ANGLE now
focuses on the commercialisation of technology and the development of tech-
nology-based industry by not only creating, developing and advising technology
businesses on its own behalf but it also does this for a number of clients.
It is clear from experience of dealing with the commercialisation of technology
that the point of entry for either supporting technology as a private investor or